


all troubles, swept away

by SaraJaye



Category: Home Improvement (TV)
Genre: Cruise Ships, Domestic Bliss, F/M, Family Vacation, Fluff, Water
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-26
Updated: 2019-05-26
Packaged: 2020-03-19 20:28:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 348
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18977779
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SaraJaye/pseuds/SaraJaye
Summary: Jill never thought there could be such a thing as a perfect family vacation.





	all troubles, swept away

**Author's Note:**

> 023 - water

A cruise, Jill decides, was the ideal family vacation and she wishes she'd thought of it sooner. Plenty of fun activities for the kids, plus all the free food they can eat, and for once all three of them are getting along. They've even made friends with a few other kids.

Tim is shockingly okay with spending lots of "couple time" together. Not exactly joined at the hip, since he still doesn't want to check out the opera museum and she doesn't want to sit in a bar watching rugby and playing darts. But that's just it. Balance. It's easy to forget that, Jill wanting to make an impression at fundraisers by dragging Tim to stuffy events and Tim just wanting to sit at home with a beer watching the game.

(Or worse, wanting her to embrace the magic of burping and armpit noises while she watched _with_ him.)

They've gone on plenty of family vacations, but those usually involve backseat bickering, Tim trying to make record time, and Jill wondering why they bothered to go away if they could just be miserable at home.

But there's something magic about being on the ocean, something that makes everyone more adaptable, agreeable. Everyone's usual vices are swept away with the waves, leaving only the occasional quibble or slip-up they can simply laugh about. Even Tim's worse jokes are funnier out here.

She leans against his broad shoulder as they stand on the deck, watching the water move lazily under them as it reflects the shine of every star and the waxing moon. Occasionally they'll see a fish or an octopus swim by.

"Too bad we can't catch it for the next hockey game," she finds herself murmuring, and Tim grins proudly at her.

"Next time we'll bring a net instead of the kids." Her heart flutters, and she snuggles closer, leaning up to kiss him.

Three months later, he surprises her for their anniversary with a couples cruise, and she realizes he'd come up with it their first day of that perfect family vacation.

The ocean really _is_ magic.


End file.
